


Fake Dating...?

by QueenForADay



Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher Series - Andrzej Sapkowski
Genre: Angst, But Then There's FEELINGS, Emotionally Constipated Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Fluff, Geralt Begrudgingly Helps, Humor, Jaskier gets into trouble, Jaskier | Dandelion Has Feelings, Jaskier | Dandelion Loves Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, M/M, Minor Jaskier | Dandelion/Original Female Character(s), Mutual Pining, POV Jaskier | Dandelion, Pining, Pre-Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion, Protective Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Sharing a Bed, Sleepy Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-27
Updated: 2020-10-27
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:14:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27234058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueenForADay/pseuds/QueenForADay
Summary: The local guards don’t join in on the chase – thank the gods. They lift their heads and watch as Jaskier darts down the cobblestone street, then followed moments later by a large gathering of male relatives brandishing anything they could use as a weapon. And Jaskier knew that he would probably die early – but that was going to be from valiant Witcher-related adventures, not at the end of Yorick’s brother’s club.When the familiar hanging sign of the tavern comes into view, he might just cry.The tavern means witnesses.The tavern means a potential escape.The tavern means a Witcher who, if the gods are good, might just help him out of this mess.Might.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia & Jaskier | Dandelion, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion, Jaskier | Dandelion/Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 28
Kudos: 299





	Fake Dating...?

It’s not like he wants to get himself into these kinds of situations. He’s not particularly fond of having to escape out of windows and evade axe-wielding, murderous brothers or fathers or intendeds. It’s just that sometimes his brain is left behind while his mouth and body rush off ahead and get all of them into trouble.

Another town he’ll have to avoid for a while, potentially forever. The Continent is big enough, he thinks, as his legs hum and buzz with pain as he rushes down the next street. He isn’t as keen to get himself exiled from every settlement in the country.

The local guards don’t join in on the chase – thank the gods. They lift their heads and watch as Jaskier darts down the cobblestone street, then followed moments later by a large gathering of male relatives brandishing anything they could use as a weapon. And Jaskier knew that he would probably die early – but that was going to be from valiant Witcher-related adventures, not at the end of Yorick’s brother’s club.

When the familiar hanging sign of the tavern comes into view, he might just cry.

The tavern means witnesses.

The tavern means a potential escape.

The tavern means a _Witcher_ who, if the gods are good, might just help him out of this mess.

Might.

Jaskier worms inside, dodging in between patrons stumbling out on to the street. They curse him under their breath, but it’s the least of his worries right now. He quickly scans the tavern, bustling with nightly orders of ale and mead after a long day of working in the nearby caves. A hum of noise buzzes through the air. It’s almost deafening.

He looks to the corners – the Witcher’s preferred seats in taverns and inns, where shadows can shroud him and he can brood in peace. And as soon as his eyes settle on a familiar head of white hair, Jaskier breathes out a sigh of relief. It’s not the end of his ordeal. The Witcher might not help him at all. There has been one case where Geralt flat-out refused to open his room door while Jaskier fled a noble lady’s bedchambers. It’s something that’s haunted the back of Jaskier’s mind since.

But as he scrambles closer, weaving between tavern maidens and tables laden with tankards and slouched over drunks, he finds that the Witcher looks...not pissed off. Yet. He looks fine. He looks like he won’t say _no_ to Jaskier, and have him face the small army of disgruntled men alone—

“Geralt,” he gasps as he practically flings himself into the booth, opposite the Witcher. “Geralt, I need your help.”

Geralt doesn’t even glance up from his tankard of ale; instead, taking a long and measured sip and letting it settle around his tongue. All of the ale and mead and rum in the Continent couldn’t wash away the headache Jaskier causes him.

He doesn’t reply. Jaskier didn’t expect him to. So words fall out of his mouth before his brain can really catch up. “Do you know that merchant girl we spoke to today? The one with the golden hair?” And Jaskier shouldn’t have to waste his breath explaining how he got himself into the mess he’s in because Geralt is already sighing, with his eyes threatening to roll. “Geralt, how could I refuse? We were having a lovely night, honest, she told me no one would be home!”

At that, the Witcher arches an eyebrow. He sets his tankard back down, sighing out a long breath. “And?”

Jaskier’s mouth hangs open. “And? What do you mean _and_? The girl’s entire family are out to castrate me. Geralt, you have to help me!”

Geralt tilts his head, musing over the bard’s words. “Do I?”

“Wha- _yes_!” Jaskier splutters. “Yes, you do! We’re friends. Best-friends! And friends get each other out of troublesome situations. That’s what friends do!”

He’s keen to remind the Witcher of all of the times he has won over tavernkeeps who wouldn’t let him board because of who, or what, he is. His newfound reputation as a hero was practically built on Jaskier’s back as he’s been barking the Witcher’s achievements and heroic deeds for almost two years now.

There really isn’t any time to goad the Witcher into helping him. The tavern door flies open and Jaskier almost jumps out of his skin. He’s sitting with his back to it, thank the gods. If he keeps his head down and just stays quiet, maybe they’ll go away—

“ _Where is he_?!” the largest man roars. It’s a clap of thunder that silences the tavern. A tavernmaid nearby almost drops her tray of empty tankards. A game of Gwent a few tables over is sacrificed for what scene is about to unfold here.

Jaskier swallows. A lump tries to lodge in his throat, thick and smothering. He’s going to die. He’s going to die in this shitty town in the middle of nowhere, and it’s Geralt’s fault for not helping him.

The family storm in. He didn’t quite get a count on them, but he winces at the amount of stomping footfalls rumble through the tavern. Jaskier sneaks a peek out of the corner of his eye. No family has any right being that big. He counts at least ten, but more could be outside, keeping an eye on the streets and the alleys wrapped around the sides of the tavern. He recognises who might be the maiden’s brothers; hardily built men with glowering faces. The older among them with greying hair and skin littered with scars and black ink must be her father, uncles, and other relatives.

He turns back around.

 _Fuck_.

The biggest of them, armed with a hammer that has definitely seen a few skirmishes and battles, scans the tavern. Each step he takes almost rattles the floorboards and rafters.

 _Fuck, fuck, fuck_ —

“Oi, you!”

All colour drains from Jaskier’s face. His heart might just give out. That’s fine. He _really_ doesn’t want his face caved in by a hammer—

Steps thunder towards their table, tucked into the corner. Just as Jaskier scents the first hint of coal and forge-smoke, there’s a rumble.

“What the fuck do you want?”

Jaskier looks up. His arms are folded – his hands would be trembling otherwise. But across the table, Geralt looks as calm as ever. Well, he looks irritated. Or it could just be his face. His brows are knitted together as he glowers up at the man.

Jaskier’s throat bobs. It’s possibly the only time Jaskier has seen Geralt dwarfed by anyone.

There’s a harsh grunt. “We saw that bard with our sister!” the larger men grits out through clenched teeth. He’s bald and his face is mostly jowl and his clothes are still dusted with coal from the mines. The steel hammer clutched tightly in a heavy fist looks ready to bash Jaskier’s face in.

 _Stay calm_ , he tells himself. It was dark and they didn’t get a good look at his face. It was dimly lit in the family’s house and he wasn’t wearing his doublet, and now he is. Maybe they might have just confused him for someone else—

Geralt hums. For a moment, a terrifying moment, he says nothing else. Other men wander through the tavern, weapons clasped in their hands and ready to brawl with either Jaskier, or just about anyone who glances their way.

“Well, it couldn’t have been this bard,” Geralt hums, “because he’s been here the whole time, with me.”

_From this day forward I will be an eternal worshipper of Geralt of Rivia. I shall build him a shrine in his honour—_

The man’s eyes narrow. “Bollocks,” he grunts, lifting his hammer to sit just in front of Geralt’s face.

The Witcher, to his credit, doesn’t even budge. What he does look, though, is exhausted. Geralt lifts his chin. A small challenge. The Witcher has faced down all walks of monsters, the most horrifying things that people can imagine, so a pissed off coal miner armed with an oversized tool doesn’t shake him much. “And how do you know that? Did you see his face?”

“We chased him to this tavern,” the man growls. There’s a shuffle of motion before Jaskier is suddenly hauled up on his feet. The man has a handful of his doublet caught in a massive hand, his knuckles white. Closer to the man, with nowhere else to look, Jaskier swallows a noise at the sight of thickly set scars and bulging veins.

He really does have a talent for bedding women with the most temperamental of male relatives.

Well, at least the last few hours of his life were enjoyable. He’ll forever cherish Clara – Cara, Sara, Tara? Who knows? – and her breasts and her skin and her hair.

 _Stop it_ , some harsh voice snaps at the back of his head.

A chair scrapes harshly on the ground. Geralt doesn’t stand, but does push himself back from the table. His swords are nearby, always sitting just an arm’s reach away. They glint in the faint candlelight of the tavern. But Jaskier has a sickening feeling in his stomach that these kinds of miners don’t quell at the sight of Witcher forged steel.

“A lot of people having been coming in and out of this tavern all night,” Geralt says calmly. His voice is as measured as it always is, nothing but a rumble coming from the centre of his chest. But his eyes, Jaskier watches them, the gold glints with something beneath them. A threat hiding, ready and perched on the tip of his tongue. But he knows how much the title of _butcher_ hangs over the Witcher’s head. He wouldn’t lift a blade to humans, not if he can help it. But Samara’s brothers and uncles are making quite a convincing case for themselves. Geralt lifts his chin. “How do you know your man hasn’t just run straight through and out into the alleys in the back?”

Yara’s eldest brother still has a hand on him. And he might be able to feel how hard Jaskier’s heart is beating. That, and the fact that he hasn’t taken one steady and full breath in the last five minutes.

Geralt sits up, setting his feet firmly into the ground and leaning forward. “I’d ask you kindly to let go of my bard,” he says. A low growl rattles through the last of his words. Just beyond the heavy, broad shoulders of the men, Jaskier eyes some of the tavernmaids scurrying into the backroom while the keep heads out on to the street. He’ll flag down some guards and maybe that will be the end of it; he prays to every god and goddess he can remember the name of, hoping that he hasn’t annoyed them too much throughout his life.

The hold on his shoulder slackens slightly—

His hand is caught. In a blur of movement, he’s tugged away from the man and his hold, slipping out of his white-knuckled hold entirely, before Jaskier falls and lands on something sturdy. He takes him a moment to gather himself and realise where he’s landed.

He’s on Geralt.

Geralt’s lap.

With his arm slowly curling around Geralt’s shoulders.

 _What the fuck_ —

The Witcher’s arm coils around his waist, keeping him close. “As I said,” Geralt growls, “he was with me the whole time. Now fuck off.”

Shock or surprise or both cool the man’s face, slackening his glower somewhat. His eyes dart between Geralt and Jaskier, never quite settling on either of them.

A nearby table of sailors, their game of Gwent long forgotten about, pipes up. “Aye, Yorick,” one of the older men mutters, “the lad has been ‘ere the whole time. Your man is long gone. Best get goin’.” An agreement hums around the table, most of the sailors fidgeting with their tankards, but a handful of them staring down the man.

There’s a clattering of heavy, metal footfalls. Muffled shouts follow. Yorick’s head snaps to the door. The guards, Jaskier’s breath catches. The man’s jaw tightens. A frustrated growl rips out of his throat before he turns on his heel and marches away. His relatives follow him, knocking against a few tables on their way out.

The sailors nearby bow their heads. “You’re alright, lad,” one of them says, gathering his cards again for a new round. “Yorick is more brawn than brains. He’ll cool off.”

There’s a harsh gull of laughter. “Clara needs to stop luring every passing troubadour into bed with her. That might help.”

“Ah, you can’t blame the girl. Living in that house, surrounded by those idiots? The girl just wants some freedom.”

Jaskier’s face colours as soon as he realises he’s still on top of Geralt. He pointedly keeps his eyes away from the Witcher’s face. No doubt he can already feel how quick Jaskier’s heart is hammering inside of his chest, rattling his ribcage.

Jaskier clears his throat. “Um, thanks.” The words bumble out from his lips. “I, uh, I appreciate it.”

Geralt hums. It’s a low sound, coming from the centre of his chest. The arm around Jaskier’s waist falls away. “You can get off me now.”

It takes a moment for him to catch up with what Geralt just said. “What? Oh!” Jaskier stands up, swallowing down on the small whine that crawls up his throat at the loss of heat. “Sorry. I’ll just, um, I’ll just head up to the room, and uh...yeah.”

And before he can bumble out anything else, he’s gone and clambering upstairs.

* * *

If he closes his eyes, he can still feel the warmth blooming through him. They’ve sat close together before, pressed and huddled under cloaks to stave off the worst of a mid-autumn chill when the weather suddenly turns when they’re out in the wilds. But this was different. Jaskier’s stomach churns with the maelstrom swirling around him.

It didn’t mean anything. Geralt was just helping. He should forget about it and leave it behind.

But his mind still lingers on it, playing it over and over again in front of him. He wants to burrow underneath the sheets, melt into the mattress, and forget that this ever happened. But some small part of him wants to get out of bed, pad back downstairs, and ask the Witcher what the fuck that was.

His chest tightens and his stomach flips and it’s _the worst_ —

Jaskier flinches at the room door clicking open and shut. Even facing the side wall, he’s been around Geralt long enough to recognise the Witcher’s steps. Light, but sure. He always toes off his boots when he’s inside, preferring to leave them near the door beside his bags. His swords are left beside his side of the bed.

Jaskier curses himself for only dishing out enough silver for a room with one bed. He could have stretched enough for another, but he’s gotten frugal over the past couple of months, especially in the autumn where coin starts to thin.

He stays still, an arm curled under his head as a pillow.

Clothes rustle and the bed dips. Geralt sighs heavily as he relaxes back into the mattress, letting sleep know that he’s prone and ready to be dragged under. Sleep isn’t kind to him on most nights. Then he’ll meditate nearby, always hovering just beyond wakefulness in case someone were to barge in.

Geralt’s breath evens. For a minute, Jaskier thinks that this is one of the rarer nights where sleep has taken the Witcher without a fight.

But a rumble of words slipping out of him tells Jaskier something else.

“Are you alright?”

Jaskier’s throat tightens. His ears twitch at the slight ruffle of sheets. Geralt glances at him, looking at the back of his head. “They didn’t hurt you, did they?”

 _Fuck sake, Geralt. Stop being nice_. “No. I’m okay.” Some small part of him celebrates how the words came out as stable as he can manage. He focuses on the wall in front of him. The wood has been varnished, pooling mainly in the small cracks in the grain.

Geralt hums. “Good. I’m glad.”

Jaskier blinks into the darkness of the room. “You’re glad?”

“That you’re okay.”

That’s...well, that’s a thing. The bard turns completely around on to his other side, facing Geralt, just to make sure that the Witcher hasn’t been enchanted with something. Jaskier watches him for a moment. “Have you been in your White Gull again? Has someone laced your drink?”

A breathless laugh huffs out of Geralt. “No, just,” he sighs, looking back up at the rafters above them. “I’ve become quite fond of you, bard. I would hate for anything to happen to you.”

“You threaten me all the time,” Jaskier mumbles. Just this morning, Geralt told him that if he wandered off of the path again, he’d be left in the next town they went into. Then again, it’s a threat that Geralt never follows up on. There’s a heart in there somewhere. When Jaskier wanders off, the Witcher is never too far behind. He’s become his shadow.

Geralt hums. “Yes, but I’m allowed to. We’re friends, aren’t we?”

The word cuts him deeper than he would like. Of course they’re friends. Geralt might be an old cantankerous bastard, but he’s fond of Jaskier and his company. He’d be left either dead in a ditch or abandoned in a small town somewhere if he truly didn’t want him around.

But hearing the word is something else. Jaskier’s chest tightens. “Yeah,” he rasps, internally cursing himself for letting his voice change.

There’s a long sigh. Sleep slowly beginning to wash over Geralt. It won’t come near Jaskier – his mind is too lost in a storm of thought to leave him be. He watches Geralt’s expression slacken. It’s been too long since the Witcher has been able to sink into a mattress and sleep.

Jaskier almost doesn’t hear the words that stumble out of the Witcher’s lips.

“Don’t get yourself into any more trouble, bard,” Geralt sighs. The distant muffled sounds of the tavern below almost shroud the words entirely. “You’re too important to me to get murdered.”

Sleep won’t be visiting him tonight. He can tell. The maelstrom in his mind only lashes out more. _Important_. Jaskier’s throat bobs. The sincerity laced through the Witcher’s voice, the soft rumble from the middle of his chest, the fact that he has fallen asleep first, trusting Jaskier that much to let his walls crumble, just a bit. It’s too much.

Jaskier flops on to his back, staring up at the rafters of the roof.

_You’re too important to me to get murdered._

It’s the kindest thing Geralt has ever said to him. And while it was laced with the Witcher’s usual dry sense of humour and a slight threat of _don’t ever fucking do that again_ , it’s...nice. Jaskier swallows.

He’s in for a sleepless night – and not the way he would hope.

**Author's Note:**

> Listen: the title of this fic isn't as flourished as the others I've thought of, but I'm tired so...¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
> 
> tumblrs;  
> yourqueenforayear (personal) || agoodgoddamnshot (writing)
> 
> twitter;  
> better_marksman
> 
> Kudos & Comments gladly welcomed! <3


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